Get Out Of My Head
by Katy Parks
Summary: Lance is just sitting in class one day when he decides to scream in his head. Gotta catch those mind readers! When he does this he sees Keith, his crush, flinch. Keith's a mind reader, Lance knows it! He just has to prove it. Unfortunately Keith goes missing before he can.
1. Gotta catch those mind readers

**Lance**

I air up my balloon. The 85th annual New York hot air balloon race was underway. I had won the last 25 years. I had only about 50 yards left when the German balloon came right up on me! I lean forward to make the balloon go faster. We're neck to neck until…

"Mr. McClain, what is the y-intercept?" Mrs. Hoover so rudely interrupted my daydream, bothering me with math.

"Um," I squint at my books "What question are we on again?"

Mrs. Hoover rolls her eyes, "If you actually payed attention in class you would know, wouldn't you?"

"Probably." I agreed with her.

Mrs. Hoover sighed, "Mr. Kogane, would you please give us the answer?" Keith looks up with a confused look on his face, and turns to face Mrs. Hoover.

"0, 8.46" Keith answers. How does he do that? He was obviously not paying attention either. No one can just look up and know the answer! Stupid perfect Keith and his stupid grizzled-ness and his stupid smartness. I glare across the room at him. We meet eyes for a few seconds. Then he just smirks and looks away. How dare he! First, he pulls the most improbable answer from the top of his head, then he just _smirks _at me! I scoff and try to pay attention.

It doesn't work and before I know it I'm glancing out the window thinking about hanging with Hunk afterschool. Are we just gonna go to his house or are we going out? Should I try to text him before school ends? Is Pidge coming? Should we invite her? Would Keith go if I asked him? Dang it. There I go, thinking about stupid Keith freaking Kogane again. Why won't that dang mullet-head just get out of my head!

Suddenly the bell rang signaling for us to leave class, thankfully saving me from be yelled at again. Quickly I gathered up my stuff, shoving them into my bag and practically teleported to the door. From there I bolted down to my locker, the meeting place for me and my friends since it's the closest to the Space Explorations class we all have next. Pidge is leaning against the wall on her phone, impatiently waiting for the rest of us. I get to my locker, closely followed by Hunk. We take our time walking through the hallway to our next class. I start retailing my embarrassing misadventure in math, maybe over exaggerating the details, but not by much.

"... And then, Keith looks me right in the eye and tells Mrs. Hoover the answer. Then he smirks at me! Can you believe that?"

"Yeah, sure," Pidge answers sarcastically, obviously not amused by my storytelling skills. I choose to ignore her and give all my attention to my faithful listener, Hunk.

"Maybe he was just genuinely trying to help you out?" Hunk, the little sweetheart, suggested.

"That's impossible Hunk! I could see it in his eyes" I pointed dramatically at my eye, "He knew he was showing me up and he enjoyed it!"

"Maybe you shouldn't make it so easy for him." Pidge said.

Before I can tell off that snarky little sophomore, Hunk stops me by exclaiming, "Oh look here's our class."

Upon entering the classroom I saw Keith sitting in the front corner of the room. How did he even get here before us?! Anyway before I could properly go on a rant about that Hunk had pulled me to our table and had started talking about our project. It was the huge end of the semester project that was worth half our grade. Our project is about the moon landing. We agreed that Hunk would handle the mechanics, Pidge would do the history, and I would work on the visual presentation.

The bell rang and the teacher started talking. Something about the effect of other galaxies on our own. I go off into my mind again. There's a new Y-Women movie coming out this summer that I can't wait to see. Pidge says the main characters are overpowered, but I say that their superpowers makeup for their emotional flaws. I wonder what it'd be like if I had superpowers. What if there are people around me right now that have superpowers? What if they are like Professor Y and could read minds? How would I know? What if I just yelled in my head? Would they be able to hear me? I could try it. I won't look stupid if there ain't no mind readers because no one would know. If I did see someone flinch? Well then I caught meself a mind reader.

"_Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"_

There was a movement of black and red from the front corner. Keith FLinched! Wait, what if he just did that coincidentally? Better try it again.

"_Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"_

Sure enough Keith flinched again but this time he turned around as if looking for a culprit. His violet eyes scanned the room landing on me. How'd he know it was me? Oh wait, mind reader, duh. Wait was he reading my mind right now!

**Keith**

"_I can't wait for Friday."_

"_Jessica's such a bitch."_

"_God, Mrs. Hoover's a buzzkill."_

"_The 85th annual balloon race was about to start." _Well that caught my attention. As usual, Lance is ignoring the lesson and going off into his fantasy land. I hate to admit it, but his daydreams make my day. No boring classwork. No dramatic thoughts about the party last weekend. Just having fun and escaping reality. I try to listen for Lance's voice over the others in the class. He's about to win the race, but the German balloon catches up. The two are neck and neck until…

"Mr. McClain, what is the y-intercept?" Damn. Kayla was right, Mrs. Hoover is a buzzkill.

"Um," Lance buries his face in his book, "What question are we on again?" Classic Lance. I know where this is going. Mrs. Hoover scolds Lance for not paying attention, then calls on some other sucker to answer the question.

"Mr. Kogane, would you please give us the answer?" I look up from my desk. Maybe I should actually listen in class instead of spy on Lance's thoughts.

Welp, that's what mind reading's for. I look at John. He always has the answers and always wants to say them. It was easy to read the answer from his mind. I look at Mrs. Hoover and deliver it.

"0, 8.46." I dully respond, before glancing at Lance.

"_Stupid perfect Keith_ _and his stupid grizzled-ness and his stupid smartness." _That made me smirk, before turning away. If I stared any longer Lance's thoughts would follow me for the rest of the day, or more than they already do.

I actually try to pay attention to class after that, unlike Lance who I could still faintly hear. Before I knew it class had ended. The others students rushed to leave but I took my time, putting in my headphones so the noise was easier to manage. My next class is Space Explorations, which Shiro helps out in. No spacing out in there; Shiro would know and he _does not_ take hearing other people's thoughts all the time as a good excuse to fail high school.

I enter the class and take my usual seat up front. As always Shiro is up front getting ready for the lesson. I swear he does more work than the actual teacher. As it gets closer to the start of class more and more kids enter. I notice when Lance comes in, he makes a face. "_How does he get here so fast?!" _he wonders. Probably because I don't drag through the hallways talking to people. The bell rings and Mr. Lindwig starts mumbling through the lesson.

Everything is going normally, that is until my mind is bombarded by the most unbelievably fake scream from the cheesiest horror movie there is. The suddenness of it makes me flinch in surprise which quickly turns into a cringe because of how awful it is. I was ready to pretend it never happened when it sounded again. The only difference this time being that I recognized it as that horrible fake scream Lance did for the school play, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

Quickly I turned coming into direct eye contact with Lance. _How'd he know it was me? Oh wait, mind reader, duh. Wait, was he reading my mind just now! _Oh god, Lance knows!


	2. THE MALL

**Lance**

"Guys! Did you see that?" I practically screamed at my friends. Needless to say everyone turned to look at me, expect Keith who had turned back around and seemed to be trying to ignore the commotion I was causing.

"See what?" Hunk asked.

"Lance, you're supposed to be working on the project, not goofing off." Mr. Lindwig said, which made everyone turn back to do their work, myself included.

Pretending to work, I asked my friends in a quieter voice, "But did you guys see that?"

"What?" Hunk repeated.

"Keith flinched! I screamed in my head and he flinched and you can't tell me it was a coincidence because I did it twice _and_ he flinched both times _and _the second time he turned around and looked me right in the eye!"

"How do you scream in your head? Wouldn't it be the same volume as your thinking? The volume of your thoughts don't change." Pidge argued.

"That's not the point! The point is Keith's a mind reader!"

"Lance buddy, I love ya, but mind reading isn't possible. Mind readers aren't real. It's all fake." Hunk tried to explain gently.

"But I saw him! He flinched! Watch I'll show you." Staring at Keith I screamed in my head like the other two times, but unlike the other times, Keith didn't move.

"Um, nothing happened." Hunk stated.

"He must know I'm on to him, so he's prepared not to flinch!"

"Lance I understand that you get bored in class but making up stories isn't how you should spend your class time. We really need to get this project done and Hunk and I aren't doing all the work for you." Pidge said.

"I'm not making this up you guys!" I looked to Hunk. "You believe me right?"

"Um, I want to, but…"

"You both think I'm lying?!" I asked in disbelief.

"In our defense it's kinda hard to believe. I mean, Keith is so bad with talking to people he couldn't be a mind reader. If he were he'd just tell people what they wanted to hear and get along with everyone."

"Or maybe he's bad with people because he hears everyone's thoughts, and knows that we're all terrible people. Except Hunk." Pidge says.

"Aw, thanks Pidge." Hunk said.

"Wait so you believe me?" I asked.

"Not at all." She answers. "Mind reading is a fictional thing Lance."

"Unless you guys want to get kicked out of the class I suggest you actually work on your project." Shiro said.

"Ah! Where did you come from?!" I said.

"I'm always here, Lance, it's my job." He smirked.

"It's not your job to scare people to death."

"No, but it is to make sure your listening and paying attention, which you weren't, so get to work." With that he walked away.

Giving a long sigh I gave up… for now. Surprisingly, it didn't feel like a long wait for the bell to ring and school was over before I knew it.

Upon getting home, I rushed to my room. I didn't feel like talking to anyone. I had been planning to do. Laying on my bed with notepad in hand I began to brainstorm ideas. I had to prove to Hunk and Pidge that Keith really is a mind reader. I didn't know what I was going to do once I convinced them, but I have got to have my friends believe me on this.

Of course, I am a McClain, and I could never expect to be left alone. I had about three minutes to myself before Luis and Marco came poking their heads in to see what was wrong. Veronica, Benji, and Rachel followed, meaning everyone except the baby was standing outside my door.

"What's wrong with Lance?" Rachel asked in a whisper.

"I don't know. He doesn't look angry or upset." Marco whispered back.

"Maybe he just has a lot of homework?" Luis suggested.

"No way. He'd have complained on his way up." Benji whispered.

I chuckled. "Guys, nothing's wrong. I'm just working on a plan for tomorrow."

"And what, pray tell, are you planning?" Veronica asked.

"If I told you you'd laugh at me and say I'm crazy."

"Don't we do that anyway?" Marco asked. I threw a pillow at him.

"This time is different. Something crazy happened at school."

"What happened?" Veronica asked.

"If I wanted to tell you, I would have already." I dead panned. They all groaned. "Look if my plan works tomorrow I'll tell you everything. Promise."

They all reluctantly agreed and left the room finally letting me brainstorm in peace. That is until Luis begged me to take the kids out while the rest of them had an adult dinner. So I had to drive Benji and Nadia to the mall to waste my precious planning time. Although, maybe a brain break is what I need.

Keith

Once class ended I rode home with Shiro, as I always do, and tried to act has if nothing was bothering me. Unfortunately for me I'm terrible at hiding things from Shiro.

"What's wrong Keith?" Shiro asked. Honestly half the time I wonder if he's a mind reader too.

"Nothing's wrong." I deny.

"_Keith, I know something's wrong". _

I sighed. "It's just another headache."

"I thought you said listening to music drowned it out?"

"It used to…"

"Used to? Are you saying it doesn't work anymore? You can't drown out others thoughts?" Shiro asked in worried panic.

I shrugged. "It's like the thoughts have gotten louder to combat the music… It seems like no matter what I do, I have to listen to others thoughts."

"Hey, we'll figure something out." Shiro comforted me, placing his hand on my shoulder.

" I don't think there's anything we can do to stop it, Shiro." I told him honestly. We slowed to a stop signs as Shiro turned to me, grabbing my shoulder

"We _will _find a way to stop it, Keith." He said, looking me in the eye. He seemed to really believe that, even if I didn't.

"Yeah, okay."

"Good." He decided to drop the subject for now, "Now we're off to the mall."

"What!?" I yelled.

"I need to get Adam an anniversary present."

"Yeah, but why do I have to go?"

"So you can tell me what he's been expecting to get." Shiro explained, like that made any sense. Noticing my confusion, he elaborated "You hear his thoughts all the time, you know what he thinks I'm going to get him. If you go, I can make sure I'll get him something he would never suspect. But not something too out there so he'll love it."

"I think you're putting too much thought into this. And what makes you think I pay attention to his thoughts? Shouldn't you know him enough to get him something."

"Well, it's too late now we're already here."

I sighed. "You know I hate the mall, Shiro."

"I also know you need to get out of the house more." he replied as he unbuckled his seatbelt, "It's not healthy to be holed up in your room all the time."

"I go to the kitchen too."

"Very funny, kid emo. Let's go." Shiro said. Kid emo? That doesn't even make sense! Nonetheless, I get out of the car and follow Shiro to the entrance.

We spend a miserable amount of time searching for a gift. Store after store and Shiro still won't consider just a box of chocolates. He won't even let me take five minutes in Hot Topic! We start for the 18th store when I hear it. The distinct thinking pattern of one Lance McClain. As always, he was thinking up something weird and useless.

"_If Dora is an explorer, why does she only go to mapped areas?" _I couldn't help it, I laughed.

"What's so funny?" Shiro asked.

"Lance just has the weirdest thoughts."

"Lance? He's here?"

Before I could answer with a yes, Lance himself yelled at us from across the walkway. "Hey! Mullet head! Shiro! Over here! It's me Lance! You know, from school!"

I groaned. Why did he have to be so loud? Not everyone needed to know our business. I was about to turn and walk away when Shiro grabbed my arm pulling me toward Lance. I slid my hand down to his wrist before communicating with him.

"_I thought we were supposed to be avoiding Lance." _I asked him through the link.

"_Yes, but it would look suspicious if I were to start avoiding him. I'm not exactly a Hot Topic-loving emo kid like you." _He thought back. I groaned again and allowed him to drag me towards Lance. As we approached, I saw two small children near Lance. They had the same tanned skin and childlike wonder.

"_His hair's long and pretty. I wanna braid it." _The girl thought.

"_Fingerless gloves? Is he in a gang? Cool!"_ Pondered the boy. Wow. I just love kids.

"Lance, what brings you to the mall?" Shiro asked.

"Oh, my brother wanted me to watch his kids so he and the Mrs. could go on a date. This is Nadia" He pointed to the girl. "And this is Benji." He pointed to the boy.

"Hi." Both the kids chimed.

"It's a pleasure to meet you both. I'm Shiro and this is Keith." Shiro introduced us as I gave a small wave.

"_Is this the Keith Tio Lance is always talking about?" _The girl squinted at me. That made me blush. I mean, I knew Lance thought I was cute, but I didn't know he talked about me all the time.

"Nice to meet you too." The girl replied politely.

"Tio Lance, I'm hungry. Can we get something to eat?" The boy requested.

"Sure, we can." Lance smiled fondly. "Would you two like to join us?"

"We can't." I said at the same time Shiro said "We'd love to."

"What?!" I turned to him almost giving myself whiplash.

"It'd be nice to eat something besides Ramen for once, don't you think?"

Quickly I grabbed Shiro's wrist. "_We can't eat with Lance!"_

"_Why not? I know you don't like public places but it's not gonna kill you to eat out once a month is it?" _Shiro thought back.

Before I could reply Lance jumped in, "Are you two having like a mental conversation or something?"

He smirked, staring right into my eyes. "_I'm onto you, Kogane." _

Lucky for me Shiro unknowingly jumped in to save my ass. "Oh sorry, you know how little brothers are." He ruffled my hair and then gestured towards the food court. With that, the five of us made our way to the food court to eat. Hopefully this goes better than I think it will.

* * *

Thanks to all who Favorited/Followed! I really appreciate it and I'm really sorry to do this but from now on chapters are gonna be held for ransom. I'm gonna need five reviews before I post the next chapter. Review are the whole reason I post stories on this site, so I can get feedback on my work. Favorites/Follows are awesome but reviews are what I'm aiming for here.


	3. Motorcycle Boys

Lance

Isn't it funny how you'll go through life not noticing something until it's pointed out to you, then you can't unnotice it. It's like that with Keith right now. Everything he does somehow supports my theory. Like how he makes weird faces and then looks up at a specific person, or when he makes long eye contact with Shiro sometimes. Especially when he rubs his head. That may sound normal at first, but imagine having all those voices in your head. You'd get headaches too, right? I wonder if he can turn it off, or if it's just there all the time? Maybe that's why he's such an emo lone wolf all the time.

"So what do you guys want? I'll pay." Shiro said, interrupting my thoughts.

"Oh, you don't have to pay Shiro. My brother gave me some money to feed the munchkins, so we're covered, but thanks for the offer."

"Anytime." Shiro replied politely.

We decided on Subway because that's the only place Benji and Nadia will eat. Damn picky eaters. We all got our sandwiches, paid then sat down to eat. At least their parents will approve knowing I took them to a healthy place. Although it would have been kinda amusing to get them hyped up on sugar and junk food before bringing them home. Maybe we'll go out for ice cream after this.

From across the table I saw Keith smile. Or was it a smirk? Which is fishy, because it was right after the ice cream thought. There are just too many coincidences with this guy. As I stared at him, his face started to look sunburnt. Is he blushing? I didn't think anything that would embarrass him, did I? Wait, was someone else thinking something embarrassing? I looked at the others on the table. Keith would be used to Shiro's thinking, so that means it must be the kids. Who knew what they were thinking.

"Tio Lance, do you like Keith?" Nadie asked.

"What!?" I asked. Where did that come from?

"You keep staring at him." She continued. _Oh God why me?_ At this point Shiro's wide eyes were slowly moving back and forth between Keith and I. Keith stared at him, probably mentally having a conversation or something.

"Well, do you?" said Benji.

"Um, I, ah… Well I like him as a friend." Smooth Lance, smooth.

"He kinda looks like those guys in your revistas." (magazines)

"W-wait, which magazines?"

"The ones under your bed." I inhale deeply, Luis's gonna kill me.

"That's because they're motorcycle magazines! All biker guys look the same!"

"You think I look like a biker guy?" Keith asks suddenly and I don't think I could be more red.

"Keith you're basically the typical cover guy. You wear fingerless gloves for heaven's sake! Besides you ride a motorcycle to school, so you are in fact, a biker guy!" I explain, only slightly panicking.

"I mean he's not wrong." Shiro adds in, causing Keith to give him a glare and a fake punch to the side.

"You have a motorcycle!" said Benji.

"Um, yeah." Keith says, easily displaying that he has no idea how to act around kids.

"Is it scary?" asked Nadie

"Of course it's not! If it was scary nobody would ride them!" Benji exclaimed. "I bet it's so cool!"

"Um, yeah, it's cool, I guess." Is Keith's uneasy response.

"Does it go super fast?"

"Can you do cool tricks on it?" Nadie asked

"Do you have flames on it?"

"Does it cost a lot of money for the gas?"

"Have you ever been pulled over?"

"Does it match you jacket or your gloves?"

Back and forth Nadie and Benji kept asking Keith more questions before he could answer them. Giving him a glance I could tell it was starting to overwhelm the poor guy. He obviously wasn't used to talking or spending time with kids.

"Ok guys, let the man breath." I interrupted them and Keith looked at me like I had just saved his life.

Suddenly, my phone went off, the Ninja Turtles theme song playing aloud indicating that it was Luis.

"Hello?" I answered.

"_Hey, you done with my kids, yet?"_

"You done with your date night already? Man, you guys are lame!"

"_Yeah, we're not, but we knew you'd forget that they need to be in bed by 8:00pm and need to have their homework done before that."_

"But it's Friday!" I exclaimed.

"_Yeah, that there is why I called. You see, kids have a bedtime so they stay healthy and get enough sleep, Lance, and you will enforce this rule while I'm gone, or so help me…"_

"Sorry bro, I'm the fun young uncle, so..."

"_Lance!"_

"Luis!"

"_Ugh. Just get them home before six."_

"Six in the morning! Wow you really changed your opinion fast!"

"_Lance! You know what I mean!"_

"Yeah, yeah, I know. I got it. I don't even know why you needed to call me. Go have fun on your date, and don't worry about your kids. I got it handled, I just fed them sugar and caffeine, so they're bound to crash soon."

"_Oh my god, Lance you didn't!" _Luis exclaimed, not knowing whether to be worried for his kids or his mom who had to get them to bed.

"Love ya, kids say hi, gotta go bye!" And cutting off my brothers concerns or whatever it is he was about to say, I hung up.

"Was that Daddy?" Nadie asked.

"Sure was. He said you guys can't have anything yummy or do anything fun." Just like I expected, their shoulders dropped and their smiles did handstands. "Buuuut-" I added with a smile, "I'm the cool uncle, sooooo as long as you promise not to tell on me we can so stay up and eat gummy bears." Like a switch had been flipped they were back to their cheery selves.

"We promise!" They chimed in unison.

"That's what I wanted to hear!"

"Wow, remind me never to hire you as a babysitter." Shiro said with a face of terror that screamed 'what are you planning to do to those adorable children'!

I waved him off. "Nonsense! I'd do a wonderful job watching Keith!" They were both stunned silent, which made me laugh.

"I don't need a babysitter!" Keith exclaimed once he got him barings.

"Keith honey, that's what all the kids I babysit say. Including these munchkins." I said as I pointed with my thumb over at the kids.

Keith just scoffed at that.

I looked up at the clock. Five minutes to six. Welp, Luis's not gonna be happy with me. Either way, it's probably best to get them home. Don't want to make the warden too mad.

"We should probably get going," I tell Keith and Shiro. "Luis said to have the kids home by six. If we leave any later, I'll have my butt handed to me."

"Well we wouldn't want you to get in trouble." Shiro says in his typical Shiro way.

"I'm already in trouble." I say with a little chuckle.

"Uncle Lance is always in trouble!" Benji laughed.

"Am not!" I exclaimed. "We're going to leave now before you guys can say anything else incriminating about me."

With that I ushered the kids towards the door. It was only when I got home did I realize that with Nadie and Benji embarrassing me I never got to put any of my plans into action.

Keith

"That wasn't so bad was it?" Shiro asked as soon as we reached the car.

I sighed. "I can never tell if I hate or like children." Shiro gave me a questioning look. "They always speak their mind so there's nothing to read, but on the other hand, they always speak their mind and I hate the things they say."

"Oh… I always forget how… Differently, you view the world."

I shrugged, not really knowing what to say.

"We never got Adam a gift." I stated flatly.

Shiro banged his hand on the steering wheel. "Dang it…" Then he shrugged, "Oh well, I'll pick it out tomorrow. Until then you pay attention to his thoughts and see what he wants."

"You want me to read your fiance's mind? I thought that was a no no?"

"You read it anyways! I'm just asking you to pay attention if he thinks about what he wants."

I sighed. "Fine, I'll try."

He smiled. "Thanks Bud, I owe you one."

Shiro drove us home and I cherished the almost silence after all the chaos of the mall. Sure there were still sounds of traffic as well as Shiro's thoughts, but his thought never annoyed me. Shiro's thoughts were always soothing in a way. He lets his mind go blank a lot, so sometimes it's quite, like now. Right now his only thoughts were the occasional ones of driving. Which way to go, what street they're on, and the one that always intrigues me: what is Keith thinking about.

Thoughts like this never occur to me since I already know what everyone's thinking, but Shiro… he doesn't know. I suppose that's what I think about: what it's like to _not_ know what someone's thinking. I wonder what it's like to be normal. Shiro might think it's cool. Mostly everyone does. But it's not. The constant voices are a terrible burden I wouldn't wish on anyone; for I wish more than anything for them to go away.

Eventually we made it home where Adam was waiting. We were all enjoying time together on the couch, talking about anything and everything, when I heard it. He didn't say anything out loud, he never does. He just thinks about it. He knows we're hiding something from him, that it's something big. He'll never ask, but I know he wants to. For the five years I've known him that's all he's ever wanted. It wasn't as bad the first year or so but soon it started to eat at him. Now he thinks about it every time he looks at me. Sometimes it's with curiosity, sometimes with malice. It's only there a second before it's gone, but it's there nonetheless. I can tell Shiro wants me to tell him, but I can't. If Shiro heard what Adam thought when no one is listening, he would agree it's best not to tell.

"You ok, Keith?" Shiro asked pulling me from my thoughts.

I nodded then glanced at Adam in what I thought was sneaky way. It most definitely wasn't, because right after that Adam thought, "_He wants to be alone with Takashi. They're going to have another private talk. God, how much 'comfort time' does the kid need? All Takashi does is take care of that ungrateful brat. He should stop wasting his time._

Adam sighed "You know what guys, I think I'm going to go turn in. I'm kinda tired."

"You sure?" Shiro asked pure concern leaking through his thoughts.

"Yeah, you guys have some bro bonding time."

"Ok, I'll be in there in a little bit... goodnight."

"Night." He said sadly walking to the bedroom.

As soon as the door closed Shiro turned to me and asked "What's wrong? Is your head hurting?"

"Nothing's wrong." I claimed unconvincingly.

"Keith, I know you're lying. Your head hurts, doesn't it? You think you'll be able to sleep? How about I get you some pain relief. Do you think that'll help?" Shiro rambled already getting up to get the medication.

I sighed "Shiro, I'm not in pain. Well not too much pain."

"That's still pain, Keith."

"Yeah, but it's not like it'll do anything in the long run. Someday it won't work."

"What makes you say that?" He asked, his voice laced with worry.

I shrugged.

"Keith." He said in his worried brother tone. Dang it. He knew I couldn't hide anything when he played up the sympathy card.

"I'm building up a tolerance to the medicine. I didn't tell you last time, but it didn't really work. It still hurt."

"What?" He asked in disbelief and worry. "_If the medicine doesn't work then what do we try? There isn't a medicine on Earth we haven't tired."_

"I know, Shiro. That's why I didn't want to tell you."

Shiro sighed, after all the time he's spent with me, he's no longer shocked when I answer the questions he doesn't voice. "It's okay, we'll figure something out. You can't stress over it Keith. Just be patient. Remember, pati-"

"I swear to God, Shiro if you say 'patience yields focus,' I'll die! I'm sick of patience. I'm out of patience. And I can't focus on anything because there's too much going on all the time and there's no way to stop it!"

"Keith, it's okay, I'll handle it. I can-"

"You can do what Shiro!? There's nothing you can do! No one can do anything about it! I'll have to live with it for the rest of my life because no one can help me!" I shouted at him.

Suddenly the papers on the coffee table catch fire and all my anger turns to panic. This isn't the first time this has happened, obviously, but that doesn't mean I'm any calmer when it does. Shiro, ever the hero, calmly notices the fire and grabs the pillow on the couch to start beating the flame out while I just stare in horror.

Shiro's shaking me trying to bring me back. When I finally come to, Adam is standing behind him. He thinks I'm a little psycho at times like this. He doesn't know the fires are on accident.

"You ok? Keith?" Shiro kept shaking. "_Come on kid, work with me. What's going on in that head of yours?" _

"_What's with this kid and fire? How'd he even make a fire? And did it really have to be my papers for work? I'm getting so sick of this! Doesn't Takashi get sick of this? I mean, what's wrong with him?" _I hear Adam think. Our eyes meet and I don't mean to, but I think my hurt shines through.

Shiro follows my gaze and sighs, "Keith, does your head hurt?" That's our secret code for anything ranging from 'Is this guy thinking something weird' to 'Are all the thoughts hurting your head?'

I glance at Adam, "I'm sorry."

He rolled his, "If your so sorry why do you keep doing it?!"

I didn't know what to say.

"Adam, he didn't mean to." Shio explained.

"Right. He didn't mean to set a fire. I'm no expert on fires, but I'm pretty sure it's rather hard to accidently start a fire!"

"Adam-"

"No, please tell me Shiro. How does a seventeen year old accidentally start a fire with nothing but his bare hands?!"

"It's complicated."

"Of course it is! And you can't tell me because I can't be trusted or I couldn't possibly understand, right? I'm so sick of this!" With that, Adam storms down the hall and slams the door to his room. There were a few moments of silence as Shiro and I just stared.

"So… What are you going to tell him this time?" I asked hesitantly. Shiro sighed.

"I don't know, Keith. I'll talk to him later. He's just…"

"Scared of me?" I finished.

"Nooo…" Shiro dragged, "Okay, maybe he is. I'm sure it'll be fine. For now, you need to get some sleep. It might help with your head."

"Yeah, okay." I went off to my room quietly and closed the door. _It'll be fine_, I repeated in my head. Everything will be fine. Patience yields focus….

_Dammit Shiro._


	4. The love tunnel

Lance

The next day I was ready. I had several plans on how to get Keith to slip up on the mind reading thing. There was no way he could keep from slipping up all the time. He was bound to slip at some point, and when he does I'd be ready.

Walking in to school I quickly spotted Hunk and Pidge waiting for me at our usual lunch/breakfast table. But instead of joining them, I head towards the library. Keith usually goes there in the mornings. There's barely any people there and it's quiet. When I walk into the library, I find Keith sitting in a corner, away from even the few people that bother going to the library. Away from all the chaos of everyone's thinking. Now that I thought about it, I had never seen Keith hang out or talking to anyone but the teacher helper. That's kinda sad.

Keith's head lifts up to look right at me and I froze. His gaze was so captivating that I couldn't look away. I realize he definitely heard me about him being sad. And about his gaze being captivating. That's gotta be one of his powers. I mean, damn. Speaking of damn, he's smirking at me now. Can he hear me from all the way over there? How far does that thing go?

Keith looks away. I might be too far away to tell, but he kind of looked embarrassed. Well, if I need to convince my friends he's a psychic, what better option than inviting him to hang with us. Steadying my nerves, I walked over to him. Call me crazy, but as I approached he stared at his hands and was fidgeting, almost trying to ignore my presence.

"Hey Keith,"

He looked up slowly, "Hi"

"Is it too loud in the commons for ya?"

"No."

"Then why do you always come here? Is there something else that's too loud for you in the commons."

"Yep, you're usually in there."

A squeak like noise came out of my mouth before I could stop it. Damn, that was a good one. Keith smirked up at me. That little bastard. I looked away from him. I couldn't stand him just staring at me. We stood like that for a while, him smirking up at me and me trying to keep my face a normal shade of pink. Eventually, he spoke up.

"Are you going to ask me to sit with you or not?"

"How did you know I was going to ask? Did you _read my mind _or something?"

"No, you're just super obvious."

"What?! Like how?"

"I mean, you come to the library and walk straight towards me. Lance in a library is already weird, then adding the approach and I have you figured out." Again, he had me gapping, not knowing what to say. Was that part of his power too?

"Well do you?" I asked.

Keith shrugged.

"I'm going to take that as a yes. Come on, I'll show you where we sit." With that I grabbed his wrist and pulled him along to Pidge and Hunk. Upon reaching the table I announced "Guys this is Keith, Keith this is the gang. The short one who practically lives on the computer is Pidge, and the big cinnamon roll over there is Hunk, sweetest guy on the earth." I explained.

"Um, you do know we all know each other right?" Pidge asked. "We've all been in the same school district since, like, eighth grade."

Oh, right. "I knew that!" I yelled as everyone laughed at me.

"It's okay Lance, we understand it's hard to remember your friends are around when your obsessed with your 'rival'." She said, air quotes and all.

I gaped at her. That traitor! "I'm not obsessed!"

"Riiight." Pidge said before turning to Keith. "Anyway, how have you been Keith?"

"Um, good." Keith answered a little startled.

"Still a man of little words I see?"

"I guess."

We all hung out until class started and didn't meet up again until lunch. Keith of course was missing from the lunch table, so, like the good friend I was, I went looking for him. Luckily, he was in the first place I looked. The library. Keith must really like it in there; must be because it's quiet. I find him sitting in the same spot he had been this morning, and just like earlier that morning, I slide into the seat next to him.

"Whatcha doing, Mullet?"

Keith looked confused. "You still want me to sit with you?"

Not even shocked anymore I continued, "Of course, were friends now."

"Friends?" He asked like it was a foreign concept.

"Yes, friends, you know people you hangout with and share secrets with?" At the share secrets part Keith seemed to tense up. "Of course we're not at that point… yet"

"Why would you want to be friends with me, though?"

I shrugged, "I've decided that maybe we'd be better friends than rivals. You know like Tom and Jerry."

"Tom and Jerry? They were never friends."

"Yeah they were! I remember there was this one movie were they teamed up to help a little girl. They actually talked in that movie too!" I exclaimed.

Keith actually laughed at that. "I'll take your word for it."

"Hey, man, you ready for this weekend?" Hunk asks me after I had dragged Keith to the table again.

"Oh hecks yeah I'm ready!" This weekend was the state fair, only an hours drive from town. Me, Hunk, and Pidge have gone every year since 7th grade when Pidge's brother offered to take us. My eyes were drawn to Keith, who was looking down at the table. He looked… sad? He's probably never been to the fair, let alone had friends to go with. Maybe…

"Hey, Keith," He looked up. "Do you want to go to the fair with us?" I asked. He paused.

"Yeah Keith! We can all get to know each other better!" Hunk encouraged.

"And you can watch Lance almost choke on cotton candy."

"Pidge! That was two years ago!" I protested, but Keith started laughing and my anger vanished. He actually had a really nice laugh.

"As tempting as that sounds," Keith said, "I don't know. I don't really like crowds."

"Oh, come on, Keith! Live a little! You can't be part of our group if you don't go! The fair is, like, a rite of passage!" I exaggerated. Will we kick him out of the group if he doesn't go? No, probably not. Do I want him to go? Definitely. I mean, only because I need more proof. Unfortunately for me and my plans, Keith still looked skeptical. So I had to throw down a challenge he couldn't refuse.

"It's fine guys," I began, nonchalantly, "We'll never know if Keith could beat my undefeated Go-Kart racing skills."

"Are you serious?"

"Oh I'm serious, Kogane."

"Do you really think you're gonna bait me with some stupid racing game?"

"I don't know, am I?" I asked smuggly. I stared at him, waiting for the temptation of a challenge to get to him. He stared back, determined not to break, but I knew it was only a matter of time before he did. Just as I predicted, Keith sighed and spoke.

"Fine." He begrudgingly answered, "But I'm not riding the Love Tunnel."

Keith

"I can't believe we're riding the Love Tunnel." I said flatly as we walked up to gross red and pink building with an obnoxious number of hearts decorating the outside.

"We have to! It's Hunk's favorite!" Lance replied, giving me the sad eyes.

"And why is it Hunk's favorite?" I asked, still very much opposing the ride.

"My uncle did the animatronics." Hunk chipped in. "For a small state fair, they're really good! I can't wait to see what they've done with it this year!" There was no way to deny this enthusiastic cinnamon roll. No getting out of riding this eye bleaching atrocity.

I sighed and silently followed the group to the line. Our not-so small group consisted of me, Lance, Hunk, Pidge, her brother Matt, and Shiro. Shiro insisted on going because there would be "an odd number of people," which is "a perfect breeding ground for exclusion." I think he forgot I could read minds for a minute there, because it was obvious he was worried about me fitting in. I knew trying to convince him otherwise would be useless, so I just let it be and made him drive the hour to the fair. Besides, it was nice having an even number when most of the rides were two-seaters.

"I call Hunk!" Pidge calls out once we're almost at the front of the line.

"I got Matt." Shiro said.

"Guess that leaves me with Mullet Head." Lance says slyly. Oh no. I looked hopefully at Shiro for some help, maybe a switch of partners. But all I see in place of his gentle, big brother smile, is a smug ass grin.

"_He needs to be social. It won't help him if he justs stands by me the entire night. I don't want him lying around on my couch his entire life" _He thinks honestly yet smugly. First of all, rude. I do not sleep on the couch, I have a room. Second of all, I know he knows I'm listening. Just the spite of his thoughts say it all. _Oh, I'm going to get him for this later_.

Lance and I were the last of our little group to get on the ride. He got oddly quiet the closer we got to the front. I glanced over at him.

"_Out of all people, why Keith? Why stupid, beautiful, distracting Keith? Oh god, I think I can see the first section of the ride. Is that a beach? At sunset?! How am I supposed to enjoy all that romantic atmosphere of the Love Tunnel with him sitting _right friggin next to me_?!" _Lance was thinking. It suddenly set in my mind that I was going to ride the Love Tunnel with the guy who had been calling me cute in his head for the past 3 years. Oh boy.

Soon enough (a little too soon if you ask me), it was our turn to get in the small, cushioned, two-seater love boat. The seat was obnoxiously small, obviously meant to push people together. Lance and I could hardly sit without our legs brushing. I stole a glance at Lance while we still had enough light. His cheeks and nose were flushed a light pink. The pink was a nice contrast to his dark, tanned skin. His blush also perfectly displayed the small freckles on his face.

The ride was lowered into the water, and we started gently careening down the sickening passage of romance. Lance's tanned, freckled, blushing face disappeared into the darkness of the tunnel. The sound of gentle waves was our only warning of the beach at sunset setting we were suddenly in.

"_Wow, first setting and they're already hitting my Ideal DateTM!" _This is Lance's idea of a perfect date? I mean, it makes sense. Even in this fake ass beach setting, he looks at home. He was practically glowing in the light. If it weren't for the obnoxious Christmas music, I would have barely noticed the ride switching sections. But alas, with Winter Wonderland playing over the speakers, I had to look up and take in the new scenery. It looked like we were inside a small cabin, a tiny Christmas tree in the corner with presents underneath. Outside the window was a snowy landscape.

"Why is there a Christmas section? It's April!" I questioned allowed. Lance, being brought out of his gay daydreams, turned to me with shock.

"Because, _Keith,_" Lance began, "Couples want the Christmas experience without having to wait for December."

"If couples can't wait and stay together til December, then maybe they shouldn't be together in the first place." Lance raised his finger to object, but the ride jerked to a stop. We looked around until we both looked up and saw… Ugh. Mistletoe. I groaned. Lance gave me an offended look.

"Come on Keith. Where's your Christmas spirit?"

"Probably in December, where it belongs." I retorted. As the ride started moving again, Lance decided to give up arguing in favor of whatever cheesy, romantic section was next. The ride moved at a painfully slow pace through many other gross sections, including the movie night section, picnic in the park, fancy dinner, bunch o' hearts (real creative there). How long is this thing? As usual, Lance is thinking… interesting things.

"_These people clearly have no idea what a good movie night is. Obviously, the perfect date night movie is The Princess Bride. Not this ridiculously fake monster movie! The point of those is to get cuddles, not put your date to sleep!" _

"_A picnic? But, how would you know what kind of sandwich your date likes? I mean, I guess Keith would know, since he's a mind reader, but what about me and the other non-mind readers out there? Unless everyone is a mind reader but me. Oh my god. What if _everyone _is a mind reader?!" _

"_Dang, all these romantic date destinations. I'm getting some ideas here. If only I had someone who I actually liked me. Then I could just ask them which ones they like best. I wonder which sections Keith likes best. Probably none of them. Buzz kill." _

"_Keith's hair looks soft. Would it be awkward if I just, touched it? Just once? Probably. Yeah, touching Keith's long, dark, soft hair is definitely out of the question."_

Sometimes I couldn't believe what was swimming around in that head of his. Yes Lance, it would be a little awkward for you to touch my hair. Maybe. Maybe? What the hell did that mean brain?

No time to think about _that _weird thought. The ride drifted into a dark room. I could see the boat in front of us leaving through a black curtain. The lights and screams of the fair could be faintly heard from outside. Almost done. Just had to make it through one last section.

As the boat exited, the curtain closed and the room went pitch black. Suddenly, the top of the room lit up with thousands of tiny lights. _Stars_. I looked up and began searching the sky. Ursa Major, Orion, Scorpius. Looks like they're going for accuracy. Impressive, but nothing to the real thing. I took a quick glance at Lance.

"_Wow, they have the actual constellations up there. In the right places! I doubt Keith appreciates that kind of accuracy. He probably doesn't even realize that they're right." _Lance's smile almost shone as bright as the fake stars above us and I couldn't help a smile of my own. The lights flickered off Lance's eyes. I don't know how long I was staring before Lance turned to me.

"Dude, are you ok? You're staring."

"Ummm," God, just think of something to say, "That's a cool wall over there." Wow, thanks brain. Lance turns to look at the black void behind him.

"There's nothing over there." He says, stating the obvious.

"Yeah, darkness. Cool?" At this point, I'm trying to save the Titanic.

"Dial down the edgy, Mullet." Lance just laughs it off. I try to focus on the stars. After that awkward exchange, it seemed like forever before the ride floated out to where we started. I took one last look at Lance before we got out of the ride.

"_Those stars were nothing compared to Keith's eyes. That was cheesy. I should use that on someone." _God, what an oblivious idiot.

After the love tunnel I decided that I needed to talk to Shiro about Lance. Lance had always had thoughts going through his head about how cute someone looked, me included. He always wonders what kind of pick up line or date they'd enjoy best. The thing is, for some reason these thoughts felt different. I didn't know what to think of it. Shiro would know what to make of all this, or at least help me sort it all out.

I was able to drag Shiro away from the group when everyone was focused on some rigged carnival game.

"We need to talk." Is all I said as I dragged him away.

"What? Is something wrong? Is your head hurting again?" He asked in a hushed but worried tone once we had gotten a reasonable distance from the group.

"I mean, it's not too bad, just a mild headache. But that's not what's wrong." I grabbed his arm and pulled him a little ways away from the group.

"No? What is?"

"It's just… I just…" I looked to Shiro for guidance but he only offered a confused and helpless face. "I feel bad."

"Okay, what about?"

"About… keeping my secrets… from people."

"What? Why? You probably know more than I do why you have to keep it a secret. There's nothing wrong with it bud." Shiro comforted.

"I'm not talking about normal people, I mean like… friends."

"You mean like Lance." He said, his big brother instinct kicking in.

"Yes, like Lance." I sighed. "He's going crazy over it and I can't help but think that life would be easier if I just told him."

Shiro frowns "In the long run it's not up to me who you tell, it's up to you."

I groaned, "Your literally no help!"

Shiro laughed. "What do you want me to say?"

"Do you think I should tell Lance? Yes or no?"

Shiro paused, "I think you should tell him if you think that's the right thing to do and you feel comfortable doing so. I'll support your decision whatever it is. Just keep in mind you have time and he'll wait for as long as you need."

I sighed. Shiro somehow knows exactly what to say to be helpful, yet also completely useless.

"Just think about it. The answer will eventually come to you" He suggested seeing my confusion. "Remember," he said with a smile.

"Patience yields focus." We said together, him with enthusiasm and me with dull repetition, like the tone kids use when reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. With that, we both headed back to the group, who was still trying to win a stupid game.

Obviously I had to show them how it's done.


	5. Chapter 5

Lance

We were all gathered around a carnival game, the one where you have to throw a dart to hit the same colored balloon. It can be very tricky since most of the time people end up popping the wrong color of balloon. So far none of my friends have been able to get more than two of the same color. On my turn I was able to pop seven red balloons, winning the biggest prize there was. A big purple hippo. What can I say? My family doesn't call me Sharpshooter for no reason.

I was just handed my prize when Keith and Shiro came back over from their little secret talk. They were probably talking about the best way to stop me from outing Keith as a mind reader, but whatever. I wasn't really focused on that today. Today was about having fun with my friends. Sure it'd be fun to try and mess with Keith, but I wanted Keith to like me as a friend not some jerk whose trying to exploit him to scientists. Although that's kinda what I'm doing since Hunk and Pidge are kinda like scientists, but they wouldn't try to run tests on him… At least not painful tests. It would be a lie to say they wouldn't want to see what he could do. I mean, I want to know too. But the point is we'd make it more of a game than a lab experiment. It'd also be of Keith's free will; we'd never make him do something he didn't want to.

Plus the poor guy already had to deal with the crowds thoughts. Oh, maybe that's what they were talking about.I looked back up from my prize to see Keith staring at me, probably reading my mind.

"Here." I said, shoving the big hippo into his chest.

He seemed shocked but took the gift anyway. "Um, thanks. What did I do to deserve this?"

"It's call a present, Mullet. Besides didn't you say your favorite animal was a hippo back when we had to do that get to know each other thing?"

This seemed to shock him more. "That was almost four years ago, Lance. How do you remember that?"

I shrugged.I wasn't a big deal that I happened to remember what Keith had said that day. It's not like I remembered anything anyone else said. Keith bit his bottom lip looking thoughtfully at his gift. Then suddenly he grabbed my arm and dragged me off to some other game. In this game you had to throw small balls into colored cups. The trick in this is that you don't win if the ball lands in the white cups that make up most of the surface of the table.

"I'd like to play, please." Keith said as he shoved the hippo back in my arms and fished out a five.

The guy gave him five balls to try and throw into the two colored cups. Keith took a deep breath and tossed the first ball which made it in the cup. The second made it in the cup as well, but the third bounced out having hit the other balls already in the cup. Luckily this didn't stop Keith from throwing the last two into one of the other cups. When the man asked Keith what prize he'd like, he looked to me.

"Pick one." Keith said, gesturing to all the prizes while taking his hippo back. I scoffed at him but pick out a blue dolphin plushie. Keith thought he could beat me at fair games? Oh, he is so on.

"So this is how it's going to be, Mullet?"

"Guess so."

Needless to say, we spent the better half of the night seeing who could win the most prizes for the other. Keith ended up with his hippo, a yellow duck, a panda, a purple gorilla, a light up sword, and a red lion. I on the other hand ended up with my dolphin, a turtle, a pink monkey, a minion, a light up gun, and a blue lion. We only stopped because everyone was starting to get concerned about the amount of money we had both spent on fair games. We had to mooch off of Hunk and Shiro for food. Worth it.

I found myself wondering if Keith would even keep all these fuzzy little animals. Would he just throw them away? Maybe he'd keep them all on his bed like I plan to do? I couldn't help but smile at the thought of Mr. Emo with bright colored animals on his bed. I was pulled from my daydreams by Keith nudging me with his arms full of I looked to him he gestured with his head towards a go-kart track.

I smirked, "Whoever wins the race is supreme winner of the night! Annnnd they get to make the loser ride whatever they want."

Keith smirked back, "Your on."

Freaking Pidge won the race! At first I had kinda liked that out come. This way neither Keith or I could have gained ground on the other. We were stuck on equal ground of winning. This silver lining only lasted about a minute before Pidge claimed we were all going on the spinning ride. That little gremlin knew we had all just ate a plate of large nachos!

It was getting kinda dark out and most of our curfews were like 10:00pm, so we knew we'd probably have time to do one more thing before leaving. I knew exactly what that thing would be when we passed the ferris wheel. You CAN NOT go to the fair without riding the ferris wheel!

"Guys! We have to ride the ferris wheel! It's like a must." I said doing my best to try and grab Keith's arm when our arms were full.

"You just want to ride the ferris wheel to get out of the Twirly Whirly Dirly." Pidge accused.

"Nooo, of course not."

"Fine," Pidge gave in, "But you owe me."

Now I have no proof but I suspect our friends planned for me and Keith to get a cart alone. The carts only hold four people max. Meaning our friends either purposely all got into one cart or they just didn't think about it. Knowing Pidge it was probably on purpose, but that's fine; I didn't mind sharing a cart alone with Keith.

We were both kinda awkward getting in with arms full of stuffed animals. Keith got in first leaving me with the difficult the difficult part. Where do I sit? Next to him? He kept his prizes in his arms, was he leaving me a seat. Do I sit on the other side to balance the cart out? I decided to be safe and sit across from him. I wouldn't want him to feel uncomfortable or nervous, and with all the weight on one side, it would lean which could be scary for some people. Weirdly Keith gave me a weird look for this, before getting up and sitting up next to me. I gaped at him as he smirked.

"Your not scared are you?" He asked, teasing.

"No!"

"Good" He said, as he placed his prizes in his old seat. He quickly took my plushies out of my hands to join his. Now I might just be imagining things but I'm pretty sure Keith leaned into me. Our knees were definitely touching! I looked up to see Keith hanging out the window looking up. His ass was practically in my face. How'd he keep it so tight? Oh god, I had to stop this. One, because he could end up getting the ride shut down and two, the butt was going to start problems if I didn't stop it.

"Keith!" I yelled grabbing his waist and pulling him back in. "You idiot you're going to fall out and die! Plus they might shut the ride down!" And because your fine round ass might cause… problems.

He frowned at me, "I wouldn't have fallen."

"I'm sure everyone who falls off something says that."

Keith pouted, "Pidge was doing it too."

"What!" I quickly stuck my head out seeing Pidge above us. "What the hell are you going gremlin? You got a death wish?"

She ignored my question, "Hey Lance, your guys cart seems to be shaking a lot. Just what are you two up to in there?"

I blushed. "Shut up and sit in your seat!"

"I will if you will!"

Giving up, I sighed and looked to Keith just in time to see his eyes move up from where they had been. Had he been looking at my butt? I smirked at Keith's blush. Oh he most definitely was.

After the fair Keith simply just sat with us, no convincing needed. It was nice; he actually became a permanent member of the group. Unfortunately for him that didn't stop me from trying to prove he was a mind reader. And although it may seem that way, I did not just bring him in the group so it's easier to prove my point. I genuinely enjoy Keith company.

Anyway, I started with simply screaming in my head at random times. It worked a few times but Hunk and Pidge were never looking and eventually Keith. Got. Used. To. It. Not fair. I then tried asking him random questions he would never know the answer to, unless he was a mind reader. Sadly Pidge and Hunk simply thought Keith had paid attention to us telling him things. They didn't even question that some things had never come up; simply assuming that the other or I had told Keith. I even tried more obvious ways like asking him what number I was thinking of. Apperntly he's not that stupid and purposely says that wrong number. After these failed attempts, I had to take it up a notch. Too bad I was out of notches. Man, devising plans is hard. How does Pidge do it?

Eventually, it was hard to think up new plans and keep operations going. Oddly, I didn't mind. Having Keith in our group was… pretty good actually. Everything is somehow better when he's around. He's a really good listener and takes my problems more seriously than Pidge and Hunk. He talks more now. I guess it's since we know him. He talks about the most random stuff. He probably bummed it from other people's thoughts, but he always says it in the best way that it would feel weird for other people to be saying it. He's not bad on the eyes either. Even if Keith is still my number one rival, he's also my friend now, and it's been going great.

But one day, Keith didn't show up to school. Or the next day. Or the next.

Shiro

Keith didn't come home Wednesday. I tried calling his phone 67 times that night, with no answer. Something was definitely wrong. This wasn't him just hanging with Lance and his phone dying early. He would have called me from Lance's phone. I tried not to worry about too much. Maybe I was overreacting and Keith was finally being a rebellious teenager hanging out with friends.

That thought went right out the window when Lance called him on the second day asking if Keiht was sick and why he wasn't answering his phone. That when my panic really started setting in. As soon as I told Lance I hadn't seen him either the boy claimed he'd be over with Hunk and Pidge to make missing posters and contact the milk company so they could put keith face on it.

I called Adam a couple of times after my call wit Lance, but he didn't call me back until his lunch break. By then, I was in full big brother panic mode.

"AdamIcan'tfindKeithdoyouknowwhereheis?!" It was rude but I didn't care. My little brother was missing and I needed to find him.

"Takashi, slow down." Adam said calmly. I took a couple of deep breaths before repeating myself.

"Keith is gone and I don't know where he went. I think something's wrong."

"Takashi, I think you're overreacting. Remember that time we 'lost' Keith in the mall, but then found him in the Hot Topic an hour later?" Adam tried to reason, but it wasn't working.

"No, it's not like that. He wouldn't go off like this without telling me. You don't know him like I do."

"Takashi, I've been living with you guys for almost a year. I think I know a thing or two about Keith." He stated, obviously not taking me seriously.

"Adam, I need you to take this seriously. He wouldn't do-"

"Look Takashi, Keith is fine. He's probably just out with Lance again. You know how those kids are."

"His friend called me, Adam! He's not with his friends!"

"Come on, he's fine. Besides, we haven't had a night out in weeks. In case you forgot, it is our anniversary tomorrow, and it would probably be better to go out tonight since I'll be off in an hour."

"This is my brother Adam! He's missing! I don't care about our stupid anniversary!"

"Oh right, I forgot. You only care about that temperamental, unpredictable orphan. Everyday I have to worry about my safety living with that dangerous kid. But of course you wouldn't know that. We never talk like we used to. Before Keith came, there were no secrets. Now, I feel like I don't even know you. You used to care about my problems. These days all you're worried about it Keith this, Keith that, always leaving me in the dark. I thought after time things would get better, that eventually you guys would open up and let me in, but it's been a year. I'm tired of waiting. How do you think it feels not being informed of a pyromaniac living in your apartment? I never know if I'm going to wake up with the house in flames. It's scary Shiro. But he's gone now and for once we can focus on us. Forget about Keith and focus on what's in front of you. Because if you don't, it may not be there tomorrow."

I couldn't speak. Wow. He must have been keeping that in awhile. I've known Adam for years and he's never blown up like this. How can he get this mad over me being worried about my brother? He should know by now that I love him. I shouldn't have to strain myself just to prove to him that I love him. By now, it should be me asking if he really loves me. Keith is apart of my life and I can't just forget about him. Besides he's not gone, I'm going to fine him.

"Adam, I understand we have some issues to work out. I know you and Keith aren't on the best of terms. But we, we don't have time for this. Keith could be in danger. That's top priority right now."

"That's my point! He's always top priority!" Adam yelled.

"No, he's not, Adam, you're being ridiculous."

"I'm being ridiculous? Takashi, this is the most intimate conversation we've had in months, and it wouldn't be happening if I hadn't have gotten rid of him."

"Wait, what?"

"I…" He didn't say anything after that.

"Adam," I said, fury filling my voice, "what did you do to Keith?" He stayed silent for a few more seconds, then spoke.

"I did it for us. I didn't-" He tried to defend himself. I wasn't listening. I just stared at the phone before hanging up. How could he? Keith was my little brother. I know first hand that Keith isn't always the easiest to be around but that's hardly a reason to get rid of him.

I shook my head as if that would clear my mind. I couldn't focus on Adam right now, I had to find Keith. Ok, think Shiro, what's the first step? Police. Yeah, that sounds right. Why didn't I do that earlier? I pick up my phone again only for it to buzz. Adam. I decline his call and blocked him. I couldn't have him distracting me right now. I dialed 911 and help the phone to my ear.

"911, what's your emergency?" asked a woman's voice.

"Um, yes, my brother is missing."

"I see and what's his name? How long has he been missing?"

"Keith, Keith Kogane. He's been missing for almost two days now. I thought he might be staying with a friend and forgot to tell me but he would've told me by now. He's not answering his cell at all. I think my ex-boyfriend Adam had something to do with it. He's at work at the Library on Clark and South."

"Got it, Sir. We'll start putting out a search for him right away. I'll send over some officers to come ask you some questions, if that's alright?"

"Yes, that would be great, thank you"

"I'll also send some officers over to see your ex. Don't worry, Sir, I'm sure he'll turn up soon." The lady said.

I nodded before remembering that she couldn't see it, "Thank you, I hope he does."

I hung up and sat down to wait for officers to arrive. I really hoped we could find Keith. I knew he could handle himself for the most part, but brotherly instincts didn't seem to even consider that; all they knew was that Keith was missing and that he needed to be found.


	6. Late Ride to Galaxy

Keith

When I woke up was in a dark place... a dark moving place. Was I in a trunk? How the hell did I get here? I swear if this is one of Lance's practical jokes I'm going to kill him. I take a calming breath and I focused on hearing the drivers thoughts.

"_Is this my turn?... Yeah, this is it… what the hell, dude?! I had the right away! Oh I would have totally punched that guy if I weren't on a time schedule." _I heard the driver think. Nothing useful just typical driver thinking. The only thing that was revealed was that it was no one I knew driving the car, I would have recognized the voice. (Everyone thinks in their own voice)

That's when I heard the other voice. Err, the other mind voice. "_I swear to god Patrick if you end up crashing and killing the kid I'm blaming everything on you!..."_

That voice sparked a little flashback: I had just said bye to my friends and was walking home, when there had been this sting in my neck. I had started to feel dizzy and fell. Just before I passed out there two sets of legs towering over me, as well as someone who thought, "_That better keep him down the whole time because I did not sign up for fighting a freak." _Then I passed out.

I was kidnapped! I frowned. How does a mind reader get kidnapped? I should have heard them around me at some point. Wait, they did call me a freak? Were they referring to the powers or my personality in general or my looks?

Suddenly the car stopped. Okay okay, get it together Keith. They're going to open the trunk and you'll fight them off, escape, and then pretend this never happened. As soon as the trunk opened I kicked out my legs hoping for the best. Turns out that was a good idea because I actually hit someone. They hit the floor with a groan and I wasted no time running away. But there was some force keeping me from moving, while another guy came to hold me still. Wait a minute. These were the guys watching me at the fair!

There was an evil laugh, "How pathetic." _This is my rival, the one father warned about? He's not even fighting back. _"Is reading minds all you can do?"

I didn't answer, just stared at the guy. He was much taller than me with blinding white hair, but he didn't seem old, in fact he seemed to be around my age. Who was this guy? How did he know about my mind reading? And why does everyone want to be my rival?

"Where am I?" I demanded. _Home base _was the answering thought from one of the lackeys.

The guy chuckled, "I am Lotor, heir to the Galra and you are my prisoner." The guy announced, ignoring my question.

"Let me go!" I spat back. He just chucked again.

"And what are you to do if I don't?" This dude was infuriating! I could feel the fire build up in my chest. _Perfect_.

"Let go of me!" I yelled.

Fire suddenly appeared on my captors clothes causing them to freak out. I smirked. Serves them right.

Lotor jumps back, patting out the fire. He then laughed, "So you are capable of more." He looked to his buddies, who apparently were still trying to put out the fire which made him roll his eyes. "Take him to a cell!"

At the order, the men (who had finally been able to put out the fire) grabbed my arms and dragged me out of the room. We walked down a white hall in silence until I heard a woman's voice, well a woman's thoughts. _Fight_, she said, _Fight now! _Not recognizing the voice I was kinda hesitate to listen. _Who are you? _I thought back. I could practically hear the sigh of frustration. _Look, the way I see it, you don't have many options. Now shut up and listen to me if you want to get out of here. _Well, I couldn't really argue with that. _Now Fight!_

I kicked the guy on the right in the knees before punching the one on the left. They really should have at least tied up my hands. I hit the one on the left hard enough to knock him out, but the guy on the right was still trying to get up. I gave him one last kick in the head, silently thanking Shiro for letting me take fighting lessons.

_Good, now walk down the hall. _Not having much of a choice, I listened.

A voice up ahead caught my attention. _Hid in the room to your right! _As soon as I got in the room voices seemed to turn the corner and stop right at the door.

"Yes, father, I should be able to get him to you by tomorrow." It was Lotor. He was talking to someone, his father, on the phone. He paused while the person on the other end of the line was talking.

"Yes father. But are you sure he's the one? He's small and has little power." More quiet.

"I see. Very well." Lotor said into the phone before hanging up. He looked around before continuing the walk down the hall, mumbling as he went.

I breathed a sigh of relief as he passed and finally took the time to take in my surroundings. I was in a supply closet. A supply closet with a window. _Go out the window, jump the fence, then make a left head down that way until you reach the bus stop. Keep heading West okay? Don't stop running until you make it home! Do you understand? They will come after you. Be careful._

I nodded, even though the voice probably couldn't see it. I climbed out the window as quietly and smoothly as I could. Once outside I jumped a fence, then never stopped running. After I ran what I felt safe distance I stopped to think. Ok, now what do I do? My phone had been in my bag, which was either in the kidnappers car truck or on the side of the road, so I can't call Shiro. I reached the bus station like the voice said to do. I also spent twenty nerve racking minutes glancing behind me to see if anyone was following, there weren't, before the bus showed up.

"Where you headed, kid?" The driver asked.

"Where am I?"

"South street, you getting on?" He grumbled.

"Um, I mean what town?"

He gave me a confused look, "Franklintown."

I nodded slowly. "How close can you get me to Galaxy?"

"That's about a 5 hour drive away. I can take you to the end of town where you might be able to take another bus farther."

I nodded and took a step on the bus, before the bus driver stuck his hand out in front of me and pointed to a box. Right, I need money to ride a bus. Goddammit. I dug around in my pockets and didn't find anything. I gave a last desperate look at the bus driver. Luckily, he seemed to understand I was having a bad day and let me on anyway. I went to the back of the bus and sat quietly.

I was tense the whole ride. I couldn't relax for fear of my captors finding me again. I probably looked ridiculous checking all the windows for my captors. I hoped to God that I could find a phone to call Shiro. He was probably wasn't sleeping and was worrying away to nothing. When the bus finally reached the last station for the night I walked to the front, thanked the bus driver, and got off. But before I could leave he spook.

"Look kid," he said. "Just because I let you on free doesn't mean the next guy will. Do you have anyone to call to come get you?"

"I don't have a phone."

He dug in his pocket and pulled out his own. "Here, you can use mine."

Tentatively, I took the phone, "Thank you, I don't know how to repay you."

He shook his head, "Don't mention it."

Not wanting to waste more of the nice man's time, I quickly dialed Shiro's number.

It only rang once before Shiro's frantic voice called out, "Keith?!"

**Lance**

"Keith?!" Shiro answered the phone. My hopes soared that it might be Keith. Then again, they've done the same thing at every telephone marketer, scam artist, or insurance agent for the past few hours. After Shiro called me with the news of Keith's disappearance, I went straight over to his apartment to help the search. Currently, we were working on missing posters for the third day. We needed more to cover every wall of every building and every phone pole.

"Oh my god, are you ok? Where are you? Are you hurt?" Shiro practically screamed through the phone. Wait…

"Is that Keith?" I asked Shiro. I leaned in to listen to the person at the other end of the phone.

"_Shiro, I'm fine. I'll explain everything when I get back. Speaking of which, could I get a ride? I'm at the edge of Franklintown." _

"Where the hell is Franklintown?!" I gasped at Shiro's use of a curse word.

"_I don't know, look it up on google! There's not exactly a state map hanging up."_

Shiro sighed, "Ok, I'm coming. Stay where you are."

"_I'm going to start walking west down the highway. I can't stay here."_

"Wait, ahhhhhhhh" he screamed at the sound of dial tone. Keith must have hung up.

"Was that Keith?" I asked.

Shiro nodded. "Yeah, he's in Franklintown, or walking down the road from it. I'm going to go get him now."

"I'm coming with."

"Ok, I hope you're a good navigator."

The drive out to Franklin was… tense. Apparently, it was a 6 hour drive west from Galaxy. Ever since we got to the highway, Shiro hasn't spoken a word. He was hunched up on the steering wheel, eyes glued determinedly to the road in front of us. His knuckles turned white as he gripped the wheel.

How did Keith get this far away? I mean, he's only been gone for three days. I know that, logically, that's enough time to get across the state if you didn't stop driving. But seriously? Clearly whoever took Keith didn't take my patience into consideration. It was going to be a long drive.I let my mind wander as I looked out the window. Unfortunately, I can only entertain myself for so long. After 2 long, _long hours_ of driving, I couldn't take it anymore. I had to ask.

"Shiro, do you think this had something to do with Keith's powers?" I didn't know if Shiro knew about Keith or not, but judging by the way his grip tightened (How is that possible?), I'd say he knew.

"What- what are you talking about?" He asked. Oh, he totally knows.

"His powers. You know, the mind reading?"

"What gave you that idea?"

"Long story short, I screamed in my head and he totally flinched." That earned a sincere, low chuckle from Shiro. Damn, I can see how him and Keith are brothers now.

"Only you would try that, Lance." He laughed, "What makes you think a flinch equals mind reading? What if it was just a coincidence?"

"No way! He flinched twice! Twice! Both times I screamed in my head!"

Shiro shook his head, "Well, if Keith _did _have superpowers, that might be why people wanted to kidnap him." There was a long pause before Shiro signed and spoke again, "Yeah, Keith can read minds. I know you might think it's cool, but it scares him, and it worries me. Normally, I wouldn't even think about telling anyone. They might use him for his power or only see him for it instead of looking at who he really is. Keith is an amazing person, but no one would see that if they knew about his power. But you're a good guy Lance, and I think you of all people deserve to know. But you can't tell anyone, alright?"

"Yeah ok… And Shiro?" He gave me a quick glance to let me know he was listening. "You're right. Keith is amazing. I won't do anything to hurt him. I promise."

"I should hope not." Shiro replied with his big brother voice. "You'll be getting a rather rude phone call from yours truly." We both lightly laughed at that, and continued in silence.

About an hour later I noticed Shiro start to yawn like every five seconds, so I offered to take over the driving. Of course Shiro denied being tired and claimed that he could continue driving. It was only after a long argument and the promise to wake him up that he agreed to be the passenger for a bit. It didn't take long before Shiro was softly snoring.

I wondered if Keith snored or if he was silent. Does he toss and turn or does he lay still? I smiled at the thought of Keith sleeping softly and quietly like a princess. He certainly looked as pretty as one. I bet he looked even prettier when he slept. His face would be all relaxed, ridden of all stress and the burden of everyone's thoughts. I sighed at the thought of Keith always being tense and angsty. Although he does look awfully adorable when he furrows his brow and puts on his cute little pout. Speaking of Keith, that guy walking kind of looks like Keith. Wait a second, that is Keith!

I shook Shiro as I pulled over. Keith looked up and started speed walking to the car. Once the car was stopped, I got out and squeezed the life out of him. Shiro soon followed, and the three of us were holding each other on the side of the road.

"Ok, ok, we hugged. Can we go now?" Keith grumbled.

"Grump much? We just drove 6 hours to come get you and that the thanks we get?!" I huffed.

"Your right, Lance. I'm sorry. I just got kidnapped! But your right, how rude of me!" Keith yelled.

"Wait, what!" I yelled.

"Are you ok? Did they hurt you?" Shiro asked, grabbing Keith and checking him for nonexistent bruises.

"I'm fine, Shiro."

"You can't just announce that you got kidnapped all casually and only give an 'I'm fine'!"

"I just did." He said before opening the backseat door and getting in. "Can we go? I don't know if the guys who took me are still looking for me. They didn't seem like the kind to give up easily, but I haven't seen or heard them around."

At this Shiro once again got in the driver's seat. "Then let's go."

I gaped at them. "How are you both acting so normal about this?!"

"Get in the car, Lance." Keith demand, but with no actual bit. Instead he sounded tired, which makes since; he probably hasn't slept in a while. Giving up my questioning for now I got in the back seat with Keith.

We started back home. Keith explained what happened to him to me and Shiro. That Lotor guy can get run over by a truck. Or do a tightrope act into a volcano. Or even go rot in some sort of weird field of existence made of energy. I don't know, I'm tired.

"Wait, so this Lotor guy could stop you from moving with his mind? He's like you?" Shiro asked.

Keith nodded, "Yeah, I think so."

"You can move stuff with your mind?" I asked. I thought his power stopped at mind reading.

"No." Keith answered simply.

"But he can set stuff on fire." Shiro added.

"You can what?!"

"Shiro!" Keith whined. "What happened to keeping it a secret?"

Shiro shrugged, "You already blew it with your flinching." He laughed.

"I didn't flinch!"

"You totally did. Twice!"

"Yeah, well you'd be surprised too if a really girly fake scream suddenly went off in your head." Keith pouted.

I smirked, "So you admit you flinched?"

Keith punched me in the shoulder. "I'm tired." was all he said before laying his head on the car door. Figuring the guy needed a break I let it go. Keith fell asleep in no time. Guess the dude really was tired, which honestly I couldn't blame him. He tossed and turned until he ended up leaning over and laying on me. But of course Keith stops moving once he's nice and comfy buried into my side. Great. Either I wake Keith up and suffer the consequences, or I get a lazy arm. I'll take the arm.

By the way, Keith does sleep like a princess.


	7. Surprise we're going

**Keith**

I woke up to a gentle shaking of my shoulder. I'm surprised I fell asleep after spending hours knocked out in a trunk. I opened my eyes and saw… Lance? Why am I sleeping on Lance?

"_Oh no, he's mad now." _Lance thought, "_Or maybe that's just his tired face?" _

"I'm just tired, Lance." I deadpanned.

He looked surprised for a second, then remembered that I could read minds. I glanced out the window. We were outside of the small, dilapidated apartment complex that Shiro and I call home. Realizing I was still laying on Lance, I got off and got out of the car. Lance followed Shiro and I up to our apartment. My first destination was the couch, where I pulled my legs to my chest and tried not to think about what had just happened. It didn't matter what happened because I was home now. I closed my eyes trying to relax but instead I was bombarded with thousands of thoughts from the neighbors. It was early in the morning, so most were gentle thoughts but still, there were so many of them. I covered my ears as if that would help.

Lance sat next to me, making the couch dip. "_He looks upset. I should say something to make him feel better. But what? Hey Keith, I know you just got kidnapped but …. Nope that sucks. Um, hey Keith, I'm here if you want to talk. Nah, it's probably too soon for that. Ugh. Maybe I should just hug him? But what if he doesn't want to be touched? I mean he didn't seem to care in the car but maybe he cares now? Maybe-"_

"Stop!" I yelled and for a second they all stopped, only to continue five seconds later.

He blinked at me. "What did I do?"

"Aaahhh! It's too loud!"

"_The thoughts are getting to him again. It must be really bad." _Shiro's voice cut in. "_I better get the pain meds. I hope they work this time."_

"Keith, here take these." He said aloud.

"They won't work!" I yelled to hear myself over the thoughts.

"_Come on Keith, I don't know how else to help you."_

Suddenly Lance pulled my head to his chest as he wrapped his arms around me. "Imagine you're on an island… far away from all the noise." He whispers.

I gave him a questioning look that I hope conveyed that I was confused and too overwhelmed to play games.

"Come on Mullet, I know it sounds stupid but humor me."

Closing my eyes I tried to picture the island.

"Focus on me… It's just me and you buddy… on our quiet little island… no other sounds to burden us." Lance whispered, running his fingers through my hair.

The longer it went on the calmer I became. The voices seemed to disappear one by one. I don't know what magic Lance was pulling, but from this point on, he was never leaving my sight. Before I knew it, I was relaxed and calm in Lance's arms. The voices of the neighbors no longer in the forefront of my mind, instead they were a distant hum.

"How'd you do that?" I asked, having finally found peace.

Lance shrugged, "Hunk has anxiety attacks sometimes and that's usually what helps him calm down. So I figured I'd try it with you...I'm guessing it worked?"

I nodded softly, "Yeah, it helped a lot, thank you."

Lance shrugged, "What are friends for?"

I found myself leaning into Lance's chest. He radiated warmth. I focused on his breathing, his heartbeat. Everything else seemed to melt away until…

"_Ummm. Should I say something?" _Shiro's thoughts came in, and I suddenly remembered he was in the room. I quickly moved away from Lance. The thoughts of neighbors came back, but not nearly as loud or as painful as before.

"So Lance…. Don't you need to get home?" I asked.

He rubbed the back of his neck, "Actually I told my parents that I was going to stay with you guys, if that's okay?"

"Of course you can Lance. I'll get some blankets for you." And with that Shiro left us, only to return with blankets, which he piled on top of our heads. "Wake me up if you need anything." He said to both of us before going to sleep.

_Wow Shiro, very subtle, _I thought as I glanced at Lance, who was still staring at Shiro's shut bedroom door. The lamp behind him really brought out the silhouette of his face, his strong jaw and cute nose. Then he looked to me and I was stuck in the deep pools of blue that were his eyes. He's so beautiful and kind.

"I'm sorry about him." I said, deciding to break the silence.

Lance laughed, "It's fine, all brothers are like that. If we were at my house, it would be the same only with my brother."

Then we were left in another bought of silence.

"So are you tried? You slept on the way back so I figured you wouldn't be, but after what happened I wouldn't blame you if you needed sleep." Lance said, breaking the silence this time.

I shook my head, "No, I'm not really tired… Are you?"

"Nah, I fell asleep on the way back too."

"Okay, so what do you want to do?"

Lance shrugged, "We could put on a movie?"

"Okay."

After a long debate between BoJack Horseman (My choice) and Supernatural (Lance's choice) we finally decided on BoJack Horseman because I got movie picking rights after being kidnapped. They weren't far into the episode before Lance's thoughts started to make themselves known.

"_Could Keith read thoughts of actors on TV? That would be so weird. He could be watching Whinne the Pooh and hear the guy thinking about how his voice hurts in the middle of the show. Or like, hear actors complain about the other actors."_

I couldn't help it, I laughed. Lance was quick to take notice and practically squacked, "What?" I shook my head, trying to dismiss it, but Lance persisted, "No, tell me."

"It's just… No Lance, I can't hear the actors' thoughts. It doesn't work like that."

Lance turned red in a matter of seconds. "Well, how was I supposed to know how it works?!"

"I figured you'd know that the person has to actually be around me for me to read their mind."

"Yeah, but you can hear the neighbors all around us."

"That's different. In movies it's the past. I can only hear thoughts in the moment. Nothing can record peoples thoughts on video."

"Again, how was I supposed to know **that **wasn't one of your powers, since apparently you have more than one now." Lance argued.

"That's not a power."

"It totally could be."

"That's such a lame power, though."

"But it could totally be one."

I sighed, "If you say so Lance."

Around 4am we both fell asleep on the couch, unintentionally cuddled up to each other's sides. I don't know why but for some reason it was really easy to relax around Lance. Something about him just made me want to confide in him, trust him with everything on my mind. Everything with Lance was both easy and extremely difficult.

**Lance **

Keith seemed to be moody and having bad headaches this week, which honestly I couldn't blame the guy, he did just get kidnapped. I've taken to walking Keith home from school, but I couldn't help but feel like I could do more. So like I do with all my problems I had an extremely long meeting with my sisters Rachel and Victoria to determine what to do. The next evening when I decided to put the plan in action. I simply showed up at his house an hour after school.

"Sup gorgeous," I yelled, slamming open his bedroom door. Of course Keith didn't even flinch. He probably heard me coming.

"What are you doing here?"

"I have a surprise for you!" I claimed excitedly. _Had I really found a way to surprise a mind reader?_

"I don't get surprised, Lance. Shiro's tried many times."

"Ah, but what I've done, my Mullet friend, is find a way to do just that."

Keith smirked, "Oh really?"

"Yep, you can't read my mind and ruin the surprise if even I don't know what it is." I explained, tapping my temple.

Keith stared at me as if reading my mind. "You had your sisters plan something?" _Yep, read my mind._

"I did and I just told Shiro on the way up I was stealing you."

Keith smiled. "That's pretty clever of you."

"Yes, yes it is."

"So what's this surprise you put no thought into?"

"What?! I put a lot of thought into this!" I yelled.

"Sounds to me that you made your sisters do everything."

"What! You ungrateful brat!" I said throwing a pillow at Keith's head. Keith just laughed. "The fact that I didn't plan it shows I put so much thought into surprising you." I pulled out my phone texting Rachel what the idea she thought of was. Her reply was quick having known I would text her. Reading her text I couldn't help but smile; my sister can be a genius sometimes.

"Well Mullet, looks like we're-"

"Going camping?" Keith finished.

I sighed, "You can let me finish a sentence, you know."

Keith blushed, "Sorry, it just happens."

"It's okay, dude… But yes we are going camping. Rachel set up a camping site for us, so we better get ready."

"Who says I want to go camping?"

"Me. Now get packing, Professor X."

"Professor X?"

"Please tell me you've seen X-Men. I swear we are going to have a people with your powers movie marathon."

Keith rolled his eyes. "I know who it is. It's just you called me something other than Mullet."

"Yeah, so? I like to keep my options open. **Surprise** you every now and again." That put a smile on his face, one of the soft cute ones.

Shiro was reluctant to let Keith go. The guy wouldn't even let Keith walk to and from school anymore. I see where he's coming from, but Keith can handle himself; the guy can catch things on fire with his mind! It was only after many promises to keep Keith in sight the whole time and explaining that it would be for Keith's health that Shiro allowed us to leave in his car. He claimed that he could just drive Keith's motorcycle; Keith didn't seem to like that but didn't say anything about it.

When we pulled into the campsite I sent my sisters a little thanks. They had gotten a campsite that was secluded from all else. This would be the perfect place to ease Keith's headache.

"Lance, you gonna help me with this or what?" Keith called pulling me from my thoughts. Somehow the emo had already started to unload everything from the back.

"Well excuse me if I want to take a moment to take in the view and atmosphere of this gorgeous campsite." I teased.

Keith simply rolled his eyes and continued unpacking.

"It's important Keith!" I exclaimed dramatically. "How else would we know where to set up everything?"

"You can do that afterwards."

"Yeah, but then it's not as peaceful."

Keith rolled his eyes again. I had a feeling that he'd be doing that a lot this trip. Oh well, anything is better than seeing him tense with a headache.


	8. Challenge Accepted

Keith

Camping wasn't as bad as I had thought it would be. Out in the woods there were no thoughts to bombard my head, only Lance's silly string of random thoughts. As soon as we had unpacked everything Lance had dragged me down to the water for a swim. Of course I knew he had planned this part before we even started driving; Lance had made me wear my swimsuit instead of normal clothes when we started out, afterall. What I hadn't caught though was that Lance had brought the sunscreen for me.

"You didn't have to bring that. I don't need it." I had claimed.

Lance replied with, "Keith please, your white ass will burn faster than gasoline." Then he proceeded to cover every inch of showing skin with sunscreen, even the bottoms of my feet.

"It happened to my uncle once Keith! He was sitting up on the shore suntanning and got burnt on the bottoms of his feet."

"But I won't be suntanning!"

"Yeah, but what if you decided to sit up on the shore and don't think about your poor feet burning." He exclaimed.

I had just rolled my eyes and let him have his way.

We swam most of the day away, only coming out to eat. There was a little mini island a short distance into the lake. Obviously that was the first thing we went to check out. With a quick race to the island, which Lance won, we were able to tell that it was deep enough that we could spend most of our time seeing who could jump off it the coolest. When we were tired of that Lance busted out the floaties. We tied them to a rock so we could just chill in the shade of the trees.

It was at this time I heard: _God, why is he so beautiful… _I gave him a questioning look. _Oh shit, he's looking at me… Oh shit he can hear me! _At this point I laughed.

"It's okay, Lance."

"Oh God, Keith. I'm just now realizing you heard everything. Everything."

"Yeah, but it's okay. It's nothing you don't normally think."

"Wait! Are you telling me you've heard me in class before!" Lance was almost panicking, grabbing the sides of the floaties to lift himself enough to look into my eyes.

"Um, yeah. I actually listen to you a lot when I was bored. You're kinda entertaining." I confessed.

"You did!" _Oh God, oh God, oh God, oh, God, oh God, oh God, oh God._

"Y-yeah" I answered shly. "Are you mad?"

"No, but... w-what kinds of things did you hear?"

"Um, my favorites were when you'd make up stories… You're a really good story teller."

"T-thanks" _Ok, you're ok. Maybe he didn't hear any of __**those **__thoughts. Maybe he only heard my stories. _

"So… Did you hear anything else?" He asked. Of course I knew what he was talking about, but would it be a bad idea to confess that? Would Lance be mad at me, claiming I invaded his privacy? I've always known that Lance found me cute, but did he really like me like that? Should I admit that I find him cute too?

"Just the thoughts of how I looked." I quickly said. At this Lance's face went completely red. _Oh please Lord, strike me dead now. _I laughed. "Those thoughts always made me smile because… Because I feel the same way about you."

"You-you do?"

"Yeah"

"Then why the hell did you wait this long to tell me you jerk!?" Lance shouted.

"Um?"

"How long were you planning on going without telling me?! Were you ever? Were you just going to let me suffer in silence!?" With every exclamation Lance leaned closer to me raising his voice. "If you knew and felt the same why didn't you ever tell me?!" Finally Lance leaned over to far and ended up falling face first into the water. I couldn't help but laugh.

Once Lance surfaced I got off my floaty so that we could be eye level again. "I was scared."

"Wait, you were scared?" I nodded, "Even though you knew I liked you?"

"I had no way of knowing if you'd be weirded out by my powers or not." I confessed. "What if you thought I was a freak?"

Lance sighed, "Oh Keith," He wrapped his arms around my neck. "I thought you were a freak before I knew about your powers."

It took a moment for it to click, but once it did, I pushed Lance away and splashed him in the face. "You're a dick!"

He laughed, "Ya gotta love me!"

I shook my head, "You're lucky I do."

"..."

"..."

"So, are we boyfriends now?"

"If you want to. Warning, I'm a little weird."

"I like weird, normal is boring." Lance assured me, but I couldn't help the need to make sure he really knew what he was getting into.

"You're sure you want to have a boyfriend who can read your mind and set you on fire by accident?"

Lance laughed, "When you put it like that it sounds like a challenge."

"I probably will be challenging. I'm not the easiest to get along with, Lance."

Lance just stared me dead in the eye. "Challenge accepted."

**Lance **

"Hey Keith!" I yelled from the other side of the camp. "You ready to go on that hike? I finished locking the food in the car so we don't have to worry about the animals getting it."

"Um yeah" Keith said, hopping up from the picnic table. He seemed preoccupied today.

"You okay there, Babe?" I asked. This seemed to startle him, which never happened, so something was definitely wrong. "Okay, spill. What's going on in that supernatural head of yours?"

Keith sighed, as we started the walk. "I was just thinking about the facility the kidnappers took me to."

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

"Do you really want to hear it?"

"Of course I do, Babe! We're boyfriends now, that means whatever you're going through is troubling me too."

That made him smile. "I don't think I'll ever get used to this boyfriend thing."

I rubbed his back, "It is now my personal goal to make sure you do." We started up a trail leading up into the forest, further away from the campsites "Now tell me what's on your mind."

Keith rested his head on my shoulder and sighed, "The only reason I escaped was because of this voice I heard. It was like they could see through my eyes. They're the only reason I escaped."

"You saying there's another person at that place like you?"

"That's the thing, it wasn't just the woman's voice. The man who hired the kidnapping could do things too."

"What!? Really? So he could, like, read your mind?" I asked.

"No, but he somehow stopped me from moving."

"You think it was telekinesis?"

"Yeah"

"Whoa… Do you think if you tried you could do that?" I asked excitedly.

Keith rolled his eyes, "I can't"

"Have you ever tried it?" I challenged.

Keith frowned, "I'm pretty sure every kid has that moment when they try to pick up the TV remote with their mind cause they don't want to get up."

"That's fair… but not every kid actually has the potential to actually do so."

"Lance, you're missing the point. What if that lady who helped me was also kidnapped and needs help?"

My eyes widened, "Oh my god, yes."

"What?" Keith asked, finally lifting off my shoulder to look up at me.

"We could actually be like superheroes and save her! It's gonna be so cool!"

"What?! Lance, we can't save her, that guy was way more powerful than me."

"So, you just need a little training"

"A little training?! Lance, this guy can make it to where I can't move my own body!"

"Yeah and you can set things on fire with your mind!" Lance exclaimed, "He's not more powerful than you, you just have a different skill set. I could help you with it. Shiro would too. We'd work it out. Once you're trained with your powers, we could make a plan and help whoever helped you."

"I don't know, Lance. How could we train something like that? It's not like there's a Youtube video on how to hone your psychic abilities. We wouldn't have a safe place to work either. Not to mention, my powers can be… unpredictable. I wouldn't want to lose control and hurt you or Shiro." There was a fork in the trail. No signs. I didn't want to interrupt Keith, so I led us left. "And Shiro… the mind stuff really worries him, and the fire freaks him out. I don't think he'd be too siked to be around it more. And there's no way he'd let me go _back _to the place that just kidnapped me for a random, faceless voice. Plus, main kidnapper seemed to know what I could do before I met him. He already knows what I'm capable of, but I know nothing about him. What if he can do more than telekinesis?"

"You're telling me that was the one time you didn't read someone's mind?"

Keith crosses his arms, "I was a little preoccupied. And it's not like he was constantly thinking about his powers."

"Can't you like, dive deeper in his mind?"

It looked like he was about to argue back but then actually stopped to think about it. "I don't know, I've never tried before."

"Really?"

"I try not to hear people's thoughts, Lance. It's rude to invade their privacy."

"Aw, you're so considerate."

Keith shrugged, "With great power comes great responsibility."

That made me laugh, "The world is lucky you have the powers and not me. I'd be in everyone's business all the time."

"You're already always in everyone's business."

"I know. Just imagine how it is now, only worse."

"Oh mighty lord help us." He joked.

"Exactly!" We laughed together. Keith's laugh was really nice. I wish he used it more often.

I took a moment to look around. By now, we were far away from the campsite. I didn't see any signs or markings to tell us where we were. Looking down at our feet, I realize there wasn't we weren't even standing on a trail.

"Hey Keith?" I said hesitantly.

"Yeah?"

"I think we're lost."


	9. The Man of My Dreams

**Lance**

Eventually after a long argument we were able to find our way back to camp. However, it was real late when we got back, too dark to do anything else, so we settled down in the tent. Keith, the heathen, slept on his back, clearly not expecting to cuddle. Well that wasn't going to fly. I laid down next to him and pulled his back to my chest so that I was the big spoon and him the little. Keith didn't say anything about this little change so I assume he probably read my mind, then decided he didn't want to deal with the argument.

It took me a while to fall asleep, whereas Keith was asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow. When I finally fell asleep I was greeted by dreams of a future with Keith. What can I say? I'm a sap at heart. Keith and I were sitting out on a picnic blanket at the beach watching the waves splash up on shore. The sun was setting, painting the most beautiful picture. Keith grabbed candles from our little basket and lit them with his mind, then set them around the blanket, creating romantic lighting.

Our eyes meet and Keith says, "You're so beautiful. How'd I get so lucky?"

"Well, I'd say reading my mind to know all the right things to do and say to get me to fall in love with you is a good bet."

Keith shook his head, "I never had to read your mind, Lance. Everything with you is easy."

Before I could say anything I heard Keith say "Lance?" But it didn't come from the Keith infront of me. I turned around to find Keith standing behind me, so like every person who sees double I looked back and forth between the two of them.

"Keith? Okay this is weird, but whatever." I said, "Come join us Keith Two."

"What the hell is going on? Why are there two of me? Where are we? What happened to the campsite?" Keith yelled.

I turned back to my sexy romantic picnic Keith. He shrugged, then got a look of pain on his face.

"Lance," Sexy Keith said, "I don't feel so good." With that, Sexy Keith turned to dust.

"Damn, I hate that movie." I whispered loathingly. "Keith Two, what did you do to sexy you?"

"I didn't do anything!" Keith replied angrily. "I ask again, where are we?"

"We're at the beach, obviously. We were having a romantic date! It was going great until you showed up and ruined it by killing sexy Keith and our romantic mood!" I yelled, then grumbled, "You could have at least jumped in and played along."

Keith stared at me blankly.

"What?!"

"It's completely normal for there to be two of me?"

"Stop, judging me Keith! I can do whatever I want in my dreams!"

Keith's eyes widened, "You're dreaming? This is a dream!"

"Well it can't be real life unless you've added duplication to your list of powers."

Keith's eyes widened even more. "I'm in your dream!"

"Well, you are the man of my dreams, Keithy."

"No Lance, I'm actually in your dream. I'm the real, Keith."

"What?!" And the next thing I knew I was bolting up out of bed with Keith doing the same. "What the hell! I just had the weirdest dream." When I turned to meet Keith's eyes they were wide in shock.

"No" I said. Keith just nodded. "No way! Were you in my dream?! What the fuck man!"

"I'm so sorry, Lance. I didn't mean to. I don't know how it happened."

"What are you talking about? That's so cool!"

"Wait, what?"

"I mean, it also means I'll never have any freaking privacy in my life, which may be an issue, I don't care how in love we are, a mans got to have privacy sometimes."

"Um…" Keith looked down and blushed.

"I'm kidding… kind of. Did you know you could do that?" I asked, changing the subject away from the blatant invasion of my privacy.

"No. If I had, I probably would have asked for a seperate tent." Keith scratched the back of his neck nervously.

"Well, why do you think it happened?"

"I'm not sure."

"Is it because you're in love with me?" I cupped my hands together under my chin and blinking my eyes rapidly as I leaned closer to him.

"I think it's just because we were sleeping close to each other."

"Nope, it's because you love me."

Keith signed and pushed me away. I just laughed it off.

"So what now?" I asked. It was still the middle of the night.

"Um, we sleep?"

"That's no fun, let's go skinny dipping!"

Keith choked, "What?"

"Skinny dipping, you know when you go swimming without a swimsuit or anything else on."

"I know what it is, but why are you asking me to do it?!"

"Because," I said exasperated, as the answer was obvious, "my swimsuit is too wet and gross, and I don't want to get any of my clothes to get wet." _Plus, it wouldn't be bad to see Keith without his trunks_.

Keith choked again, and this time his face turned a bright shade of red. And he can read my mind. Goddamn my incessant sexy thoughts.

"Lance" Keith said, guiding my chin lightly so we could meet eyes, after I had ducked it in embarassment. "Don't ever be embarrassed about your thoughts, cause I promise you I have the same ones."

"Damn Baby, you can be smooth when you want to be."

Keith smiled, "Come on, goof"

"Where we going?"

"Skinny dipping." He said then winked before exiting the tent.

For a moment I could only gap at him. Was this actually happening? When I finally came out of my daze, I was frantic to catch up with him. There was no way I was missing Keith swimming naked.

**Keith **

After last night, Lance seemed desperate to help me get the hang of my powers. I told him there was no point but he insisted that we had to help the lady who helped me. I couldn't deny that I didn't want to help her. I just didn't think there was much I could do. Setting the place on fire wouldn't help her, she'd just burn to death. Plus who's to say that she was a prisoner and not like, a worker that felt bad for me or something. However, since I actually like this idiot, I decided to just go with it. I figured that just going with it was going to be a common theme in this relationship

"Okay Keith, I've devised a plan that will totally level up your powers!" Lance exclaimed excitedly while pacing in front of me while I finished breakfast.

"Would you quit comparing me to comics and video games."

"What's wrong with being compared to comics and games? Literally every kid on the planet has wanted this opportunity at some point in their lives!" I glared at him. "Fine. How would you suggest I phase it, Mr. Picky Pants?"

"I don't know, not like that?"

Lance groaned, "I don't understand you sometimes."

I shrugged, "I just want to be normal, Lance. Reading minds isn't a blessing; it's a curse. I know exactly what people think of me and it's never anything good. And sometimes it's so bad when lots of people are around it's like I'm at a rock concert with everyone screaming but like times four."

Lance gave me a pitying look as he sat down next to me. "It doesn't matter what others think of you. Just know the ones that matter most, like me and Shiro, like you enough to counter all the others. Besides, training will help with all of that."

"Okay, but how am I supposed to do that if there are no people to practice blocking out?"

"Well, we aren't really practicing that yet. This is a headache break weekend so we'll work on that when we go back to town. Today you're going to show me everything you can do and I'm going to write it down ." Lance explained.

I nodded slowly, "Okay, so you're basically making my stats card?"

"I knew you were actually into comics." Lance laughed.

"Whatever… So where do we start?"

Lance smiled excitedly, beautifully. _I can't believe he's agreeing to this. _I shoved his shoulder for that. "Tell me everything! When did you first realize you could read minds? When did you start your first fire? Is there anything else you can do?" _The more I know the better I can help. _

That made my heart squeeze. Biting my lip I reached over so his hands were held in mine. _I can do this, _I projected to him.

"Holy shit! You didn't talk!"

I laughed, _No, I didn't. I'm projecting my thoughts to you. _

"Oh my god! Is this what it's like reading people's minds?"

"Yeah, kinda, only I have to really push my thoughts to you, while when I hear thoughts it's like people are talking." I explained.

"This is so cool! We can have secret conversations now!"

"Yeah, I thought you'd like that." I laughed, "The only thing is I have to be touching you for it to work."

"Oh okay, so we should work on your range... What else you got?" He asked, taking notes in his notebook.

"I don't have anymore other than the fire, reading minds, and now the dream thing. All things considering you should be satisfied with what you got."

"Geez Keith, chill. It's just a question. I want to help you." Lance said, reaching out to hold my face. He looked at me like I was the most amazing thing in the world, like I hung the stars in the sky.

Pulling away I said, "I'm not as cool as you think I am, Lance."

Lance smirked, "Yeah, that's what I kept trying to tell myself before we dated, then you kept getting cooler. Now I've just accepted that you're way cooler than I ever could have imagined."

"Sap." I rolled my eyes. "So how do you plan on 'leveling me up?'"

"There's only one way to level up anything: Practice."

"What?"

"You have to practice! You just have to try new things."

"Like what?

"Think outside the box you know? Like you were able to get into my sleeping mind what if you could get into my mind while I'm awake? Since you do all the mind stuff what if you can control people? What if you tried freezing things instead of burning? What if-" I covered his mouth before he could continue.

"Jesus Lance. I assure you I can't do half of the stuff you said. I know how badly you want me to be all powerful but I'm not."

"But you said so yourself that you've never tried. You're shooting down the possibilities just because they aren't the powers that jumped out without your consent." Lance explained and I'm conflicted about how it kinda makes sense. "I know you're scared of being too different from everyone else, Keith, but you shouldn't be."

"It's not the being different part that scares me, it's how it will affect the people around me. What if I accidentally hurt you? Or Shiro? Or any of our friends? I don't think I'd be able to live with myself. And now I have people after me. It would be so easy for them to use you or Shiro to get to me. The less people that know the safer we all will be." I tried to explain.

But honestly, I don't think I could ever put how afraid I am into words. My recent tied up ride in a box truck doesn't help much. Now, instead of just worrying about keeping myself in check, I have to think about if these people are going to come back for me. Or worse, the people I love. It seems like I just managed to come out of my shell and make friends, then something like this happens and suddenly I can't enjoy my time with the people I care about because I'm too worried that _something _is going to happen. I just couldn't get the image of Lance tied to a chair with a gun to his head out of my mind. God this must be how Shiro feels.

Lance must have seen how stressed I was, because he gently took me in his arms. I let him hold me for a while. It helped me relax a little, knowing that right now, in this moment, everything was okay.

After a while, Lance pulled away, but still kept his arms around me.

"Keith, I know I've said this a million times already, but your powers are amazing, and they could really help people. And what if someone attacks again? If you got the hang of your powers, you could defend yourself. Then you wouldn't have to worry about them as much, because you could take care of yourself. Plus, getting control of your powers would make it less likely for you to have an accident. We would just need to be careful about it. I may not seem like it, but all older brother's have to have some sense of caution. Even if, in my case, it's small. If you want, we could start with something less dangerous like the mind stuff." Lance said. I could tell he was still a little overly excited about the training, but he tried to sound more reasonable about it.

I thought about all of what he said. What caught my attention the most was the thing about defending myself. I wasn't thinking so much of defending myself, but defending those around me. I would hate it if someone got hurt, or killed, because those people wanted to get to me. But it would drive me insane if I was helpless. I knew that if my kidnappers came back for Shiro or Lance, then I'd have to be ready. I couldn't let them take someone I loved away from me. And like Lance said, we didn't have to start with the dangerous fire stuff.

I glanced up and Lance was gently looking at me, being surprisingly patient as I thought it over. The thought of him in danger crossed my mind again. But this time, I imagined being able to save him. Of course, I was a long way from being a superhero. Heck, I don't think I'd ever be. But if I could make his life safer, then it was worth trying.

"Ok… What training do you have in mind?"


End file.
